Pros and Cons of Outsourcing

A lot of blue chip companies, as well as budding corporations, make use of outsourcing to take advantage of several aspects. Outsourcing provides companies the chance to save more capital by seeking manpower from other sources.

A number of agencies have already downsized because of the looming financial crisis. Crowley, a huge company, has downsized thousands of workers and has chosen to outsource instead.

Many companies in the United States prefer to outsource because of the capitalist structure of the economy. Small businesses are also gradually following huge scale companies to have a more efficient system at a reduced cost than what they would normally pay average workers.

A good example is Mike Filsaime, a marketer who formerly functioned as general manager of Toyota in New York City. He has now more than 20 employees working full time for him over the internet.

<b>What is Outsourcing?</b>

Outsourcing is the process of transferring management and daily execution of functions to an external service provider. The service provider and company will enter an agreement sealed by a contract. Means of production will be provided by the client company in the form of manpower, resources and assets.

Some of the usual aspects or functions outsourced by huge and small-scale companies include information technology or IT, accounting, customer support, and human resources. Other functions that are usually outsourced include telemarketing, web development, ghostwriting and CAD drafting.

Outsourcing may also be referred to as offshoring. Multi-sourcing describes big outsourcing contracts, usually covering the IT division. The process allows various parts of a client business to be sourced using various service providers.

Strategic outsourcing is the organizing arrangement that arises when companies depend on intermediate markets to offer special functions.

<b>Should You Outsource?</b>

Any company has the choice of outsourcing a particular function or doing it using the available resources and manpower in-house. Deciding to outsource is done at a strategic level, usually needing approval from the board.

Outsourcing leads to supply chain function being done using a third party. The process starts with the firm selecting the particular activity to be outsourced and giving justification to the choice. If it is established and approved, the search will begin for the best outsourcing partner.

<b>The Pros and Strengths of Outsourcing</b>

Communication has been enhanced significantly by the internet, so bosses can easily make commands and other changes, simply by using tools and methods available online.

Meetings can be held using online conferences. There are also other gadgets and technologies available at present that can help bosses and managers get in touch with different workers belonging to particular sections, regardless of time and location.

Leverage is one of the most advantageous aspects of outsourcing. Business owners get to save more money, save more time, as well as conserve effort in directing sales and other transactions in the business.

Since the owners can acquire individuals living on the other end of the world, they can adjust the salary according to the standards of the given area. They can easily seek willing workers who are also quite comfortable with their pays, thus leading to more efficient and happy employees.

Delegation is very important in running a multi-faceted company. Owners may divide the company into sections and categories, assigning different online workers for each and oversee the entire operation to prevent common pitfalls. They have the opportunity to brainstorm the pros and cons of outsourcing and develop effective ways to let the business grow.

Delegating allows business owners to acquire people with specific talents. This is highly important if your company involves several functions and offers a variety of products and services. In some cases, company owners may need to pay very skilled and talented workers more. It is important that you pay well, according to the specific strengths of the individual to garner optimum results.

<b>Knowing the Cons and Risks of Outsourcing</b>

The current global financial crisis has put several jobs at stake, especially in first world countries like the United States and United Kingdom. Most huge and small scale companies have recently been preferring talents coming from smaller nations who do not require very high pay checks.

At times, people from remote sources may even offer better skills and experience than those who have been working full time with the company. The present recession in the United States has slashed hundreds of thousands of jobs, leaving most employees homeless.

Outsourcing has the disadvantage of not allowing bosses to fully monitor the activities of employees, primarily due to location. They are limiting their scope of observation based on the own efforts of managers assigned in the same remote region.

Assessment of potential workers are limited as well, as bosses can only conduct online interviews or provide short tests to determine or guess the efficiency of workers.

<b>Preventing Pitfalls</b>

Dishonesty can occur, since the system of management is not entirely hands-on. Business is conducted over thousands of miles, wherein a single dishonest manager can manipulate how other workers or a certain division is run.

Business owners need to be more careful about the sales and financial status of the company to prevent losses. In some cases, losses may be unavoidable. Although you get to save costs in labor and manpower, more expenses may be needed for checks and maintenance.

Every company needs to consider the pros and cons of outsourcing first before deciding on a particular function. The choice may lead to better results and lower expenses if done correctly, or poorer outcomes at higher rates.

Icontact Email Marketing Review ? the Pros and Cons

Overall Rank: 5 out 5 stars

iContact is a very user friendly application. It was built with the novice in mind. The iContact interface is easy to navigate and visually appealing. The application is feature rich which allows you to gain more for your buck. Based on my review I would give iContact a 5 out 5 as it stands the test all in areas evaluated.

Pricing – Ranking: 5 out 5 stars

iConact is reasonably priced. The minimum pricing for 1000 Contacts is $14. They also offer a Free Trial for 15 day.

Basic Features – Ranking: 5 out 5 stars

Pros

iConact has a very rich feature set. Some of the basic features they offer are actually paid services with other email marketing services. One of these include the Survey feature. The Survey feature allows you to create surveys so that you can get the input from the people you have in your database. Utilizing this feature you will be able to gear your newsletter and product promotions to what your customers actually want.

Another great basic feature iContact offers is Image Hosting. iContact’s image hosting plan allows you to host up to 500kb of images on their servers thus eliminating the need to host your images outside of iContact.

Cons

None

Creating Messages – Ranking: 4 out 5 stars

Pros

iConact allows you to use a WYSIWYG editor to create your messages. In addition to creating messages using HTML and the WYSIWYG editor, you also have the option to import a website despite the server the website resides on. I’ve personally used this feature and it brings the website in exactly the way it looks on the web. This is a GREAT feature to use to make sure your newsletter and website maintains it’s branding without having to recreate your newsletter from scratch.

If you aren’t design savvy, iContact offers over 300 templates you can use instead. Just looking at iContact’s visually appealing interface, it’s clear that the templates they offer are just as jazzy and professional. You will also have the ability to setup autoresponders. Autoresponders are essential to any online business. They allow you to automatically keep in touch with your clients based on their interest.

Cons

According to feedback I’ve received, iContact’s WYISWYG editor adds extra HTML code when copying/pasting from a Word document. It appears that once it’s a problem it’s difficult to rectify. The easy solution to that would be to copy/paste from a text editor. The only other thing here is that they do not offer an option to add attachments to your emails.

Reporting and Tracking – Ranking: 5 out 5 stars

Pros

Tracking the results of your campaigns is absolutely necessary to determine what’s working and what’s not. iContact has a set of reporting tools that will assist you with this task. You will be able to track the number of people that open your newsletter, click on links in the newsletter, and even be able to tell how many of your emails are undeliverable. Say for instance you have 1000 contacts in your database. You decide to send 500 of them your newsletter on Thursday morning and the other 500 on Thursday evening. Utilizing the reporting and tracking features in iContact you can then determine what time of the day on Thursday yields the best results.

Cons

None

List Management – Ranking: 4 out 5 stars

Pros

How your list is managed is one of the most important factors in email marketing. Some of the key features that iContact offer in this category are list segmentation, sign up form generation, automatic duplicate removal, double opt-in is optional, automatic unsubscribe and many more.

The two list management features that jump out at me are optional double opt-in and the ability to design custom forms. When someone signs up for your newsletter on your website it’s nice to decide whether or not they need to verify their subscription. Don’t get me wrong, subscription verification has it place and generally yields a higher open rate. Utilizing the custom forms feature allows you to request information unique to your specific campaign. This is an excellent tool.

Cons

None

Sending Options – Ranking: 5 out 5 stars

Pros

iContact offers all of the standard sending options available with other email marketing services. Some of these include sending via the internet, html and text message options, and spam check. While these are generally standard services for most email marketing services, the key is reliability and usability. iContact stands the test in both areas.

One feature that iContact has that others don’t is the ability to manage events. If you are person that do teleclasses or any other event oriented marketing this would be an ideal tool.

Cons

Although iContact offers the ability to to schedule a future date to send your emails they do not have a time option. This can be a rather important feature if you learn that sending out newsletters at a specific time greatly increases your open and clickthrough ratio. No worries though, starting out you can go in an queue up your campaign at the specified time that you need it to be sent.

Support and Extras – Ranking: 5 out 5 stars

Pros

iContact offers tech support via phone, email and online. They also have a community that you can ask questions concerning the use of iContact. Your newsletters will be published in an archive for other users to view as well. You will be given a url that you can direct people to allow them to read your newsletters online.

Cons

None

If you enjoyed this article, please visit my Online Business Blog and Digg this article. Also leave comments if you have anything to add.

For more product reviews, see Resource Center for Online Businesses

To your online success,

Keyeraines

Copyright © 2008 Keyeraines Unlimited, Inc.

Outsourcing Help: Pros And Cons Of Outsourcing

BENEFITS OF OUTSOURCING

Cost

Cost is the primary reason why companies turn to outsourcing. Outsourcing eliminates fixed costs almost completely, together with the high initial capital outlay needed to fund new departments and the periodic costs of maintaining them. There will also be no costs related to idle capacity as you can adjust your workforce anytime you want, reducing or increasing it at your will. Also, outsourced workforce is cheaper than a workforce from developed countries.

Time

Another great benefit of outsourcing is its speed. Outsourcing companies can put together a workforce of qualified professionals tailor fit to your needs in no time. Outsourcing eliminates the rigorous process of hiring individuals for your new task force. Also, your obligation to an outsourced workforce ends upon completion of the undertaking. Unlike if you form a new workforce in which you will have to pay the workforce continuously even in times when their services are not needed.

Skills

An outsourcing company can provide your company with skills that you currently do not possess. Typical example is when a company needs to utilize a certain technology in does not at the time understand, it resort to outsourcing a workforce that has the skills it requires. It is faster and less costly than training your own employee to gain the said skills.

Empowerment

Because your outsourced workforce will be doing the dirty work, the individuals in your company can now focus on more core competencies and developing their craft. They can concentrate on higher tasks. They will thus become more efficient in leading your company towards attainment of its goal.

AILS OF OUTSOURCING

Need of Constant Management

The most frequent reason why outsourced projects fail is the lack of constant and proper management. A good manager is vital in the success of outsourced projects. You need an active manager that will maintain constant contact with the outsource provider. The leader should fully understand the company’s demand of the outsourced workforce and should ensure that the provider is also always updated about these demands. The manager should make sure everything is kept under control and all is under his oversight.

Increased Frustration

Several factors brought about by outsourcing can cause immense frustration on the company. The first factor is the time difference. There is usually around a half day differential between the company and the outsource provider. This may cause difficulties in communication. Like for example, a question may be raised on Sunday, answered on Monday, reply requested on Tuesday, and a response received on Wednesday. The difficulties however can be greatly reduced by scheduling periodic meetings like once a week for example. If ever a far difficult problem arises, it may be solved by conducting extra meetings. A decent and professional outsource provider will surely understand the necessity for good, timely and constant communication and will surely be willing to meet with your schedule.

Another problem that may arise is unsatisfactory quality. There are some outsource providers that willingly sacrifice the quality of their services for more profit. The low quality of the services provided by the outsource company will definitely be a problem. These can be solved by getting all those who can help involved. Code reviews should be done regularly and make sure everyone, including the outsource provider adheres. Complacency will result to poor and non-maintainable products that will just add to your troubles.

Employees may also make the outsource provider their scapegoat whenever they do something wrong. Some employees will tend to take advantage of opportunities to pass the blame to the provider. This may cause miscommunication and disagreements between you and the provider. To solve the problem the employees should be empowered. Encourage them that the company is willing to teach employees who commit mistakes ways to avoid making the same mistakes over again. Ask them to try and work problems out with their respective department.

More Difficult Testing

Generally, testing an outsourced product is difficult in the sense that whenever a problem is discovered, the findings have to be communicated to the outsource provider. This could be a problem especially if the provider cannot reproduce the problem, therefore, will find difficulty in coming out with solutions. Having two different machines, the one use by the company and the one used by the provider, may cause test results not to match. This can be eased by exchanging information about both equipments used to produce the product to be able to trace the possible sources of the difference in quality.

Morale Degradation

Choosing to outsource a project instead of generating it internally can adversely affect company morale. Employees could see this as a threat to their jobs. This matter should be cleared as soon as possible to avoid internal havoc and confusion. If their jobs really are at risk, then the employees should be notified right away to mitigate the spread of bad morale. On the other hand, if jobs aren’t really threatened, the employees should be assured that their jobs are safe. It should be made clear that the outsourcing will even pave the way for employees to escalate their working capabilities.

Take time to research and you will find that there are many companies out there willing to provide you with outsourcing help.

To help clear things on outsourcing out, CallComLeads is always happy to be of service.

You can also check CallComLeads for more info on insurance leads.

Antispam and Antispyware, Protect Your Computer Against Intruders – How do They Work? How to Use Them? Pros an Cons

Intruders like spam and spyware can pose as a serious threat to laptops and affect their proper functioning. The spam messages flooding your laptop are a nuisance of sorts. Spyware, on the other hand, allow others to gain access to your laptop without your knowledge and control its functions while the user remains unaware. These problems can interfere with the proper use of the laptop as well as protecting the personal data saved in your machine.

Antispam software has been developed by various companies for blocking the infiltration of spams in your laptop. The antispam software acts as filter that scans the e-mails sent to your machine. Whenever it detects a bulk mail or unsolicited content in your laptop, it sends the e-mail directly to the spam bin instead of delivering it to the message inbox. This prevents the delivery of unsolicited messages with the possibility of containing bugs or viruses to your laptop.

Antispyware software is a new addition to the range of products necessary for keeping your laptop free from risks and hazards. The antispyware software detects the presence of spyware and prevents it from gaining access to your laptop. Spyware gives an individual access to the personal data stored in a particular machine without the consent of the user. This is dangerous as someone can control the functioning of the laptop without your knowledge.

All laptop users commonly utilize the antispam and antispyware software as security measures. These help in keeping a check on the functioning of the laptop. These software for your laptop are easily available online. Some versions of the security software are for sell, and need to be updated regularly for better results. You can also download certain antispam and antispyware software for free from the Internet and use them. Installing the software on your laptop is easy, all you need to do is download them and click on the install software option available.

The chief advantages of antispam and antispyware software in your laptop are numerous. Once installed in your laptop they can serve as a security check against spams and spywares. Spams filling up your message inbox can be an irritating problem, while spyware is a serious threat. Imagine someone gaining access to your laptop data without your knowledge! These filters help to keep your laptop free from these risks and threats and you can use your machine without the fear of spammers or spyware-users.

However, there are certain disadvantages of installing antispam and antispyware software in your laptop as well. The software reduces the functioning speed of the laptop, which hampers the working speed of the user subsequently. In case of antispam filters, sometimes e-mails that are not spam are delivered to the spam bin in your laptop because of any unsolicited part of the content. These filters target particular words and if e-mail content has that word it is immediately sent to the spam bin. This means that sometimes the e-mails go into the spam bin because of a certain word or even a part of a word.

The Pros And Cons Of Using VoIP For Internet Phone Calls

The field of telecommunications is almost constantly in a state of rapid change and that is certainly true today as VoIP technology continues to grow in both quality and popularity. VoIP actually stands for Voice over Internet Protocol, and it is a way of transferring telephone calls across the internet to a distant computer or telephone without the use of your local telephone company.

A very good way to sample VoIP technology is through using instant messaging programs such as Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, and AOL Messenger. All of these programs allow you to use a microphone and a set of speakers connected to your computer to make free PC to PC audio calls. For those instant messaging programs that also include video and allow for more than two people to be connected at any one time, you can even hold your own internet video conference easily and inexpensively thanks to VoIP technology.

All you have to do is download one of these above mentioned programs free of charge, install it on your computer, and connect up your microphone and speakers, to be able to sample this technology and see if you like it or not. If you do, and chances are that you will, you can then sign up for a VoIP subscription plan with one of the major VoIP providers to let you take full advantage of all of the features that VoIP has to offer.

One of the big advantages of VoIP subscription plans is their minimal cost when compared to local telephone companies. When you start shopping these plans you’ll see a large difference in cost between them and what you pay for your telephone service now, and that is no doubt the most attractive feature of VoIP technology to most consumers.

However, there are a few drawbacks to using VoIP for telephone communications that you should also be aware of. First of all, you will most likely need a high speed internet connection in order to get the best results when using a VoIP application or program. It can be done on a dial-up connection, but your results can be very spotty and inconsistent, sometimes even downright frustrating. On a high speed connection though, you should experience voice quality that very closely rivals that of land line telephones.

One other consideration is that it can be difficult to call 911 using a VoIP program if you don’t know where you are. 911 operators are unable to perform a trace on calls that originate from an IP telephone or computer, so there would be no way to locate the caller if they cannot identify exactly where they are. However, VoIP providers are currently working on this problem and hope to have a solution soon.

As you can see, there are both advantages and disadvantages to using VoIP technology for your telephone communications. By being aware of both the pros and cons, you should be able to make an informed decision about whether or not VoIP will work for you.

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